It’s a growth industry.
Medical marijuana, increasingly legalised south of the Canadian border and long okayed for registered patients in Canada, looks to be in Satori Resources’ (
TSX:V.BUD,
Stock Forum) future after several moves appear to have lined up what they’re calling a shift to ‘agri-mining and agri-pharmaceuticals.’
Satori’s plans aren’t specific, but also aren’t hard to work out, being as their ticker symbol is BUD, and the word Satori describes a strain of marijuana from Nepal known for its ‘cerebral high and strong potency’.
But the quiet rumblings of a potential move into the hemp world didn’t do much for the price of Satori shares until Tuesday, when it jumped 185% as the company announced the signing of
medical marijuana industry consultant Scott Walters as an Advisor for Agriculture.
The company has recently gone through a
small financing round, and admitted it was ‘
evaluating new projects in the ‘agriculture, medical, technology, finance and resources’ areas in recent news releases, but doesn’t get into specifics.
That said, if you put those industries together you get something green, underground, profitable and leafy.
Even the Walters announcement buried the lead somewhat, calling him “a senior management consultant to private and public companies within the mining and agricultural industries", and noting he "specializes in due diligence as it relates to a variety of consumer and agricultural products, particularly in relation to Marijuana for Medical Purposes Regulations (MMPR),” before moving on to his investment financing background.
Pretty good chance he’s not being asked to set up a wheat farm.
Satori owns 100% of a mine not far from a Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting facility in Flin Flon where government-contracted mine-based marijuana grow ops supplied around 20% of the regulated Canadian market before they were shut down in 2009. The reason for the closure was the inability of the growers to agree a long term lease with HBM, and that put around twenty people out of work.
The US state of Colorado announced yesterday, having recently allowed medical marijuana, that it had taken in $2 million in tax revenue in the first month of legalized operations. It joins an increasing number of US states moving toward relaxation of marijuana restrictions and taxation of the proceeds.
Mine-based grow operations are considered more secure, better protected from accidental propagation in surrounding areas, and easier to control from a climate standpoint than traditional grow operations.
And there are a lot of empty mineshafts around. Perhaps there'll be one less soon.
Satori has a market cap of $4 million with 46.7 million shares outstanding.
V.BUD shares fell 15% on profit taking after Tuesday’s elevated activity, dropping to $0.085 in late trading Wednesday on extremely heavy volume.